“Nintendo president assassinated by Freemasons” conspiracy theory floats around social networks

It has been five days since Satoru Iwata, the much beloved president of Nintendo, tragically passed away, and fans have been dealing with the sudden loss in numerous different ways – some with written messages, some with heartrending art.

They say there are five stages of grief that people may go through in times like this: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. However, according to an anonymous dissertation circulating around Line, someone found the magic whistle and warped all the way to grief stage 6: accusation of an omnipotent clandestine society.

The document claims that in the time leading up to his death Iwata had been making drastic changes to the direction and principles of Nintendo. Some examples of this as cited by the essay include:

Nintendo had previously resisted entering the smartphone market and held the position that consoles would always be superior. However, recently they have made moves to work with Japanese online game e-commerce giant DeNA.

Iwata had once said that 3DS games became boring if the 3D functionality was turned off. However, later the 2DS – a machine which lacked a 3D screen – was released.

Nintendo announced that software production outside of Japan has increased, when actually it has gone down.

After refusing to cut the price of game machines, the 3DS had its price slashed by 40 percent fewer than six months after release.

Nintendo had affirmed that they would provide games to the “other side of the world” but recently withdrew from Brazil.

The somewhat spurious writing goes on to say that Iwata had been taking on more and more of an autocratic style of leadership as Nintendo slid further into the red. However, despite suggestions that he should step down he continued to cling to his position, even as his health began to decline.

In come the Freemasons. You may remember last year when we ran a shocking piece that exposed the Freemasons as a group of people who network and fund the occasional children’s soccer tournament. However, according to this essay, in their downtime the Freemasons are also secretly controlling the video game industry. “How” you ask? The document explains, complete with anti-Semitic non-sequiturs.

‘Nintendo was selling playing cards when they got the idea to make game machines by the Japanese version of the Magnavox Odyssey II game console developed by a Jewish big-time technician. This was all facilitated by the founder of Atari, Nolan Bushnell. The name “Atari” is derived from the Japanese word meaning ‘to hit a target.’ It’s actually a faction organized by the secret society of the Freemasons with the ‘target’ of controlling the Japanese people. The way to do this was to rekindle the Space Invaders boom that was started earlier by the Jews. Since that time, dignitaries of the Masonic Order have been behind the Japanese game industry and Nintendo, continuing to keep the people of Japan lazy and stupid. However, President Iwata tried to resist this.’[anonymous]

It paints quite a bleak picture of a video game industry puppeteered by mysterious powers who not only make us fall in love with cuddly pokémon and plumbers, but kill off even the most powerful of us if we get in their way. And despite this theory’s paranoia and bigotry, it’s still more comforting to believe in than the truly frightening reality of what actually happened.

Satoru Iwata died from cancer. He had cholangiocarcinoma which is a relatively rare but deadly form of cancer which affects the area around the liver. It either requires multiple operations or a full liver transplant for the patient to even get a chance at lasting five more years. Without successful surgeries the patient’s remaining time is much shorter. Like all cancers it’s sudden and indiscriminate. It also kills you, makes your survival attempt a grueling emotional and physical journey, or both.

If there’s something enlightening about Satoru Iwata’s death for the rest of us, it’s the reminder that any one of us is a potential target and we should all get examined regularly and donate to cancer research whenever possible.